Accessibility - Bold content for screen readers

Question

Hi,

I'm looking to make my courses more accessible for those with screen readers.

For bolded text, do I need to embed  before and after the already bolded text, or does Canvas already do this automatically?

Thank you.

asaylor · Answer

If you highlight the text you wish to bold in Canvas and then click the bold button, it adds a strong tag for you. Example: CODE for Bold You can check this by clicking the button in the lower right corner of your RCE (some places have this blocked, I believe, but that is how I copied this code to show you). I hope this is helpful! Anne

ipriest · Answer

Adding strong tags should automatically add the visual bold effect.

I wanted to add too that while using strong meets the technical requirements for accessibility, it does not always account for user experience (that is, not all students are familiar enough with their technology to know what that means exactly). I always encourage faculty to consider additional ways to communicate bolded text, such as using asterisks (*) around the text in question.

Chris_Hofer · Answer

Hi there, @kathryn4 ...

I'm not an accessibility expert, but one of my former teammates told me a few times before she left that bolding text isn't accessible.  I was searching for some information on this, and I thought I'd share some links of what I've found with you:

* Accessibility: The use of emphasis in text (siteimprove.com)
* H49: Using semantic markup to mark emphasized or special text | WAI | W3C
* html - Is it ok to use  in place of  blindly? - Stack Overflow
* Accessibility at Penn State | Bold and Italic Formatting in HTML (psu.edu)
* Screen Readers Don’t Convey the Semantics of STRONG and EM · Matthias Ott – User Experience Designer

Hopefully some of these links will be of help to you.